RHODESIA VOTE

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32775, 27 November 1971, Page 3

RHODESIA VOTE

‘Abstention used often’

(N.Z. Press Association)

WELLINGTON, Nov. 26. The Prime Minister (Sir Keith Holyoake) gave reasons today for New Zealand’s recent abstention from voting on the Rhodesia question in the United Nations.

The first operative para-1 graph of the composite draft | resolution before the United! Nations proclaimed that there i should be no independence for Rhodesia before majority rule, he told Parliament. New Zealand could not support such a proposal, because it would have prejudged the outcome of the negotiations in Salisbury and prejudged the acceptability of the negotiations to the Rhodesians. “If the statement is acceptable to all parties and to the majority of Rhodesians it would be acceptable to us,” he said. Sir Keith Holyoake went on to say that abstention was often used by New Zealand and other countries to indicate their support for the in-. tention of a motion, but their opposition to one or more paragraphs. The question was raised in the House by Mr A. J. Faulkner (Lab., Roskill). In the roll-call vote 99 countries supported the draft; three—Britain, Portugal and South Africa—voted against it and 10 abstained. These were the United States, Australia, Belgium, Canada, France, Italy, Luxemburg, Malawi, the Netherlands and New Zealand.